July 2, 2007 8:23 AM

It's All About the Money

It's sadly fitting that the week we celebrate our Independence Day -- a holiday of core patriotic values, the meaning of which gets a bit smothered by excessive bunting and forgotten in the food coma of tasty burgers -- is also the week we hear how much the Presidential candidates raised in their second quarter.

By now you know Obama's soaring numbers: another $32 million, from an unheard of total of 250,000. As someone pointed out recently, that's one out of every 1,200 Americans.

David Sirota helps sober us up a bit from this fundraising euphoria, asking what exactly it means and what Obama will do to effectively channel this grassroots energy.

I want to step away from Obama -- the man, the phenomenon and the campaign -- and ask us to look at our own obsession with the almighty dollar. Is this how we want the week of America's founding holiday to be flavored? We don't see many greens on our 4th of July barbecues, but green is now the official color of American politics, surpassing red, white and blue.

Nobody has bragged about how many volunteers they have (or if they have, the media hasn't repeated that boast)? About how many house parties? Aren't these also signs of an energized electorate? (To be fair, Obama has been drawing huge crowds as well as big bucks.)

There is something of value in the symbol of the donor, beyond the value of his or her currency: it shows a commitment, a willingness to step out of their comfort zone to engage in politics. And, weirdly, that message should resonate this Independence Day.

Unfortunately, just as our Declaration's message is drowned out by holiday advertisements, the same may be true of our candidates' fundraising efforts: a civic core, that disappears into a culture of consumerism.

A cynic may say "that's American." But I think we can be better than that.

Oh, and by the way, now that soft money is back -- thanks to the Supreme Court deciding that millions of dollars from corporate interests represent free speech -- all of Obama's fundraising may prove less significant...after all, there are some super wealthy people just ready to drown his grassroots support in a full-on blitz of "issue ads."